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Agency Workers Regulations Ireland

The Protection of Employees (Temporary Agency Workers) Act 2012 was signed by the President on 16 May 2012 and is retrospective back to 5 December 2011. It was put in place to provide temporary agency workers the right to the same basic employment and working conditions as those directly recruited by the hirer (client).

Who is covered by the Act?

An agency worker is defined as an individual who is employed by an Agency who may be assigned to work for a person other than the employment Agency. Therefore limited company contractors are excluded from the provisions of the act.

Temps can be paid more than their directly hired counterparts (just not less) but they cannot be compensated for one benefit by increasing another (e.g. extra pay for less holidays).

“Basic working and employment conditions” does not include: sick pay, payments under any pension scheme or arrangement
or financial arrangements (this specific wording moved from one section of the Bill to another section).

Anti-Avoidance Measures

Assignments forming part of a series of assignments shall be treated as a single assignment.

It is deemed to be the same assignment if it is the same hirer, or person connected with the hirer, the agency worker is the same person, same place of work or directed and supervised from the same location and does the same or similar work.

A break of 3 months does not constitute a series of assignments.

Client (Hirer) Obligations

Inform any agency worker of any vacant positions for the purpose of enabling the agency worker to apply for that position.

A hirer shall, with respect to access to collective facilities and amenities at a place of work, treat an agency worker no less favourably than a comparable employee unless there exist objective grounds that justify less favourable treatment of the agency worker.